Ray McNulty: Kurt Abbott's new job a labor of love

Martin County Sheriff’s Deputy Kurt Abbott, left, talks with a man who was arrested during a probation sweep in March. Abbott is a former major league baseball player who played in the World Series with the Florida Marlins. He has been working in law enforcement for the past 5 years.

Ten years ago, Kurt Abbott was playing his way to a second World Series, running around major league ballparks and chasing grounders and catching everything that came his way.

That was then.

This is now.

Five days ago, Abbott was fighting crime in Martin County, running through the mud at Halpatiokee Park and chasing fleeing felons and catching one of the two suspects.

“It brought back memories, the feeling you get chasing down a suspect on foot like that,” the former Florida Marlins infielder was saying after his Tuesday morning adventure, which ended with the arrests of two South Florida men who led Palm Beach Gardens police on a high-speed chase up I-95. “It’s like hitting a home run in the big leagues.”

Except, for him, even rarer.

Abbott, primarily a utility player, hit only 62 home runs in nine seasons with the Marlins, Oakland Athletics, Colorado Rockies, New York Mets and Atlanta Braves.

But, as he was quick to add, “I haven’t been in 62 foot chases.”

Not yet.

Give him time, though: He has been a cop for only five years, the past four as a deputy with the Martin County Sheriff’s Office after starting with the Stuart Police Department.

“That,” Abbott said of his last week’s heroics, “is what you sign up for.”

But not everyone does — especially former major leaguers who played on one World Series winner and two National League championship teams, and earned more than $4 million during his baseball career.

So why him?

Why did Abbott take on a second career in which he is asked to put himself in harm’s way, and do so for a fraction of the salary he was making in baseball?

Lots of reasons, some of which his former baseball buddies will never understand.

His interest in law-enforcement goes all the way back to those Marlins years, the mid-1990s, when he was living in Davie with his wife, Stacey. She had a couple of friends who were Fort Lauderdale police officers, and he would go on ride-alongs with them.

“About three times a week, I’d sign a waiver and go riding,” Abbott said, recalling nights when he held an IV bag for a pedestrian hit by a van and used his baseball fame to help officers on domestic-disturbance calls talk to the men involved. “There’s a lot more action down there, and it was exciting.

“So when my baseball career ended — I busted my Achilles, so it ended suddenly — I had to come up with something else to do. I was only 33 and I needed to do something.”

And not merely to occupy his time.

He had put a big chunk of his money in real estate, where his investments didn’t pay off as he had hoped, and he had a wife and two young children to support.

“The money wasn’t coming in anymore and it was still going out, so I needed an income,” said Abbott, who moved here in 2003. “I also had to create another retirement.”

He considered staying in baseball as a minor league coach, but he didn’t want to be away from his family. So after taking a year off, helping to raise his daughter, Kyra, now 11, and son, Kyle, now 9, he decided to look for something closer to home.

“I didn’t want to spend five months in Jamestown, W. Va.,” Abbott said. “I love my kids more than I love that game.”

If that weren’t enough, his mind kept drifting back to those ride-alongs with the police — something he continued in Denver and New York while playing for the Rockies and Mets.

That’s when he began having serious discussions with his wife about becoming a cop. And in February 2004, after being hired by the Stuart police, he enrolled in a five-month program at the Law Enforcement Basic Recruit Academy in Fort Pierce.

“There was a lot of homework,” Abbott said, “especially for someone who hadn’t been to school since I was 18.”

But he graduated, passed the 350-question state exam and spent a year working for the Stuart police before joining the Martin County Sheriff’s Office. He now is assigned to the Community Oriented Policing Unit, where he regularly attends school functions, interacts with citizens at community meetings and gets to know them individually while on patrol.

Of course, he also assists road deputies when needed — as was the case last week, when he cut his hand scaling the barbed-wire fence separating the park from the interstate, trudged through a ditch and chased down a criminal.

“I didn’t know what to expect,” Abbott said. “I saw the two guys get out of the car and take off for the park, and it was on. I didn’t know if they were armed, so I had to use extreme caution, but I wasn’t going to let them get away.”

One of the suspects slipped in the mud and fell, and Abbott apprehended him. The other was captured with the help of a K-9 unit.

“The body feels pretty good,” said Abbott, who also was in the news four years ago, when he responded to an apartment fire and carried a woman from a smoke-filled building. “The only soreness is from the cuts and scrapes from that barbed-wire fence.”

He’s 40 years old, he’s living where he wants to live and he likes being a cop, even though the money — deputies with his experience earn less than $50,000 annually — isn’t close to what he was making 10 years ago.

Sometimes, he misses baseball.

But he still gets to play ... sort of.

“I started playing softball with the Sheriff’s Office team in the Law Enforcement Games, and that’s fun,” Abbott said, “but it’s not big-league baseball.”

That was then.

This is now.

THE KURT ABBOOT FILE

Major League career highlights

* Batted .256 with 62 home runs and 242 RBI in nine seasons with the Oakland Athletics, Florida Marlins, Colorado Rockies, New York Mets and Atlanta Braves.

* A shortstop/second baseman used primarily as a utility player.

* Played every position except pitcher and catcher.

* Member of 1997 World Series winning Marlins and 2000 National League champion Mets.

* Career earnings: $4,237,000.

* Last player selected in 15th round of 1989 amateur draft.

Jim Leyland, his manager in Florida and Colorado: “You can put Kurt Abbott anywhere on the field and bat him anywhere in the lineup, and he’s not going to hurt you.”

Ray McNulty is a columnist for Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers. This column reflects his opinion. For more of his thoughts on sports, you can follow his blog at www.tcpalm.com/mcnulty. He can be reached at ray.mcnulty@scripps.com.